Alice Ashiwa is not a fair TA. Even though I made sure to talk during every discussion section she gave me a B for my participation grade instead of an A, which meant my final grade was an A- and not an A. For essays she gave low B+'s. She refused to give papers a good grade and she said she would grade the last paper harshly in comparison to the first. Professor Hirano is a good lecturer but he needs to make sure his TA's grade papers similarly. The lesson to learn is not to get Alice Ashiwa as your TA, she is unfair and expects people to write flawless essays in order to get an A.

Professor Hirano was thoughtful and patient throughout the class. The chats during office hours and his responses to questions in class were genuine and showed his willingness to help students navigate otherwise difficult and complicated topics. However, the assigned readings and learning materials were sometimes hard to understand and abstract. It is also challenging to fit and fully explain the many ideas and philosophies into a ten-week course.

I took this class in my freshman year. It is still the best class I have taken at UCLA. There were two essays, a group project and weekly reports (that were only a paragraph long). Hirano is an extremely engaging professors, he doesn't care ıf the students get the small details. He emphasizes the students understanding the topics at a more general level. The topics discussed in class, the figures that are taught and the textbooks that are assigned are all very interesting. There is attendance in lectures, but even if there wasn't, I still would've gone to every lecture. The TA Rory was also amazing. I hope I can take another class by Hirano when I am a student at UCLA.

Kats' 9C class is a little bit harder than before. Participation is now down to 26% (17 for bi-weekly homework assignments, and 9 for discussion attendance). The midterm and final essay are now extremely influential on the final grade. This was definitely to nerf the A ratio... But hope that it doesn't hurt as bad as it seems. Still, his lectures are extremely engaging and gives good insight to Japanese history.

If you need a relatively easy and interesting GE, I would highly recommend HIST 9C with Katz. He has an unorthodox method of teaching history where he teaches based on Big Ideas rather than chronologically. This at first was very weird because we started in the 7th century jumped to World War II and jumped back to the 17th century. Nonetheless, his lectures are very informative. The textbook is one of the readings but the class is very manageable without it. Though be warned that your grade will be predominantly determined by the TA. That is because they are the ones who ultimately grade your weekly papers and Midterm Paper. My TA was awesome and made the discussion a highlight of my academic day (Shoutout to Sally !!) Although his grading scheme is strict and doesn't scale/curve, he provides extra credit. His extra credit is presentations from other professors and honestly are very interesting. (These were my favourite part of the course). He also doesn't believe in tests are memorisation which is super nice and made the course relatively low on stress. Though there are a fair amount of readings, some of which are admittedly boring, I would recommend reading them. It's not 100% required but it really helps with participating in the discussion and reading them will make the papers A LOT easier. I only went to office hours a few times but they were very intriguing. Specifically, it is one on one time to talk about any topic really and I often talked about the extra credit presentations.

His grade scheme is as follows:
17% Weekly Participation
9% Section Discussion
34% Midterm Paper 1
40% Midterm Paper 2
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A 93-100
A- 90-92
B+ 86-89
B 80-85
B- 77-79
C+ 74-76
C 70-73
C- 65-69
F Below 65 or those who miss 6 weekly assignments

As a conservative taking the class of a professor in critical theory (basically neo-Marxist in my opinion), I honestly think it's a really fun and insightful class even if you don't agree with some of the conclusions he draws. He's also very knowledgable about the plethora of topics in Japanese history. So you can talk to him about pretty much anything.

People have been giving him lower ratings recently (he used to be 5 stars) because he's cracking down on those premeds who just want to get an A without attending a lecture or doing anything. I'm completely on his side though. He prepares a lot of really engaging lectures Just put an ounce of work into the class and you'll get an A - it's not anything too much.

If you're interested in learning about Japanese history or even historical/myth analysis techniques, I highly recommend this class.

The lectures were concise and organized, the readings weren't too overbearing or numerous, attendance was taken via 1-page paper on readings due before each lecture, there were no exams, the midterm was a take-home research paper with sources provided, the final was the same just without provided sources, the grading was fair, there were extra-credit opportunities. Overall, excellent experience, best history class I've ever taken, would definitely recommend.

I enrolled into this class during week 2 and Professor Hirano was very lenient about me making up missed assignments. Every week there are two assignments due based off of the readings. Some of the readings are from his course website and some are from the books he assigned. Professor Hirano is without a doubt a leader in his field, the sheer amount of knowledge he has with regards to Japanese History is astonishing. His lectures are extremely helpful and clear, if you go to lecture and take good notes, you will be more than prepared for the Midterm (paper), and the Final (paper). There are no in class exams. This class is not your typical history class, rather than just spewing historical facts, he takes the class through Japan's history through the lenses of various Japanese philosophers. Take this class if you like history, you will learn a lot.

You have to do the readings for this class because before each lecture you turn in a one page reading response but you only have to read enough to answer the prompt. They're very easy and he gives you an automatic 100% if you turn it in and answer the prompt. There are no exams just a midterm paper and final paper. The midterm paper draws directly from reading and lecture so it's important to keep up with the readings and go to lecture. DO NOT USE OUTSIDE SOURCES. They will take points off of your paper if you do this. I wasn't very interested in the subject but professor Hirano was really passionate about the subject and it ended up becoming one of the most interesting subjects I've taken at UCLA. Honestly it was a great class. 10/10 recommend. Also selling some of the books necessary for this class and my notes (I went to every lecture and got an A) text me at 559-287-9333.

This class is very easy if you do the assignments. It takes some time but is very worth it. I liked the assignments because they forced me to become acquainted with the readings, and the homework is a good percentage of your grade (maybe 30%?). Professor Hirano's lecture may not be the most compelling in the world, but I still found them to be pretty enjoyable.

I would advise students to go to this class on time. Do not leave early unless you tell him beforehand! He will ask you why in front of the entire class. This did not happen to me, but please be respectful in this class. You do not want the embarrassment of being called out.

I never personally talked to Professor Hirano and he didn't know my name, but that didn't stop me from enjoying this class.

I got a B on the midterm paper because I thought we were supposed to use material from the lectures to prove our points. They said my paper was well done, but I didn't input my own perspective in my paper and regurgitated the lecture material. This was due to my misunderstanding of the prompt. Remember to base your paper on the readings! I was able to get a high A for the final when I understood this.

I think this is a class where as long as you fulfill the requirements, Hirano leads you to success. He also has very a nuanced perspective on Japanese history and I thought the information he gave us was very valuable.